Youth Exhibitions

Some agricultural shows reserve places and sessions to showcase youth achievement and enterprise. Here is an example of a show that allows Youth Exhibitors to showcase and apply what they’ve learned in school and beyond. Horticulture exhibitors are given the opportunity to create their dream landscape (see photo). Poultry and Rabbit exhibitors can showcase their breeds qualities and strengths in our showmanship class. Market Steer, Swine and Lamb exhibitors show their best work on how to properly groom an animal in our fitting and grooming competition.
Each exhibitor is then given the opportunity to share their knowledge with fairgoers by participating in the Ask Me Talks, where fairgoers are given the chance to ask the questions they’ve always wanted to ask, such as maintenance, or how the animal is groomed to how much that 1,200 pound steer may eat in any given day!

Showcasing the contribution of young people to agricultural development

One way of encouraging youth enterprise and entrepreneurship in agriculture and related activities is to create spaces and opportunities for them to showcase their talents and endeavours. This could be facilitated by organising youth showcases at the growing number of regional gatherings such as the Pacific Arts Festival, Pacific Youth Festival, South Pacific Games and so forth. Not only could these events help showcase youth contributions to agricultural development but they could also become a focus for youth groups to produce food to cater for such large gatherings.

Initiative NSL 6 of the Pacific Youth Strategy 2010 calls for the organisation of regional youth trade shows to showcase the contributions of young people to economic development.

We would be grateful to hear from anyone who has been involved in such programmes or to receive suggestions on showcasing youth activities. Please do share your ideas.